The Princess, the Dragon, and the Fool
by TangQianHui
Summary: In which Yukina is the damsel in (not so much) distress, Hiei is the dragon who guards her, and Kuwabara is a would-be knight in shining armor. There's also some blink-and-you'll-miss-it Hiei/Kurama. It's a light, fun, fluffy read. Hopefully you'll laugh. Enjoy!


_A/N: Welcome to my oneshot! I was reading too many romance stories and then a silly mood came over me... this is the result. It's not particularly polished, but hopefully y'all enjoy. _

_I do not own any of the YYH characters, and I don't profit in any way from this fanwork. It's purely for entertainment purposes. _

Once upon a time, there was a princess in a tower, guarded by a dragon. She was very beautiful, and when she cried the tears turned into precious gems; suitors came from far and wide in hopes of gaining her hand - and more often, her wealth.

But the dragon was very powerful, even though he was all of five feet tall. So anyone who dared to try and breach the tower walls was summarily slices to pieces or burnt to a crisp. If the dragon was in a particularly foul mood, it might be both.

The fact that he was not really a dragon, merely a man with the power of one, was a secret his victims carried to their graves. And if the princess was not _truly_ a princess, since her family was not royal at all… well, that didn't matter either. She was just a girl called Yukina, with a magic she'd never asked for. And Hiei, the so-called dragon, was her brother and guardian.

Mundane details like that didn't stop the rumors. In each telling, Hiei was more fierce - a dragon shrouded in flames as black as sin, carrying the power to raze a city in one arm. As the stories grew, Yukina became more and more radiant, with the riches of the world hers to bestow upon the right man.

For her part, Yukina didn't much worry about men. It _was_ dreadful when Hiei killed them, of course. But she pitied their suffering far more than she minded being alone.

Her tower was only two stories tall, so she wasn't exactly trapped, and Hiei's friend Kurama had helped her build a particularly beautiful garden for her to spend her days in. The flowers she grew attracted birds, and Yukina loved to listen to them singing.

It was not a bad life, at all. And it _had_ been, once, before Hiei had found her and rescued her, so she was grateful. She'd never been the exploring type anyway. The only reason she'd left the mountains in the first place was to search for her brother. Now she had him, and a place to sit with her birds and her flowers, and she thought that was enough.

Hiei _was_ the type to get restless, but luckily the stories of his power attracted plenty of challengers. Most were small fry; destroying them was more tedious chore than anything else. But some were strong, and he relished those fights.

It was an easy life. He didn't have to seek out battle, since it came to find him here. And Yukina was safe, even happy. Hiei had no complaints.

At least not until the morning the oaf arrived. He was tall, with a face like a hatchet and a voice like sandpaper, nauseatingly earnest in his proclamations.

"I am Kuwabara Kazuma, and I'm here for the beautiful maiden Yukina!" he yelled, planting those shovel-like feet wide in a fighting stance.

His power was negligible, and Hiei scoffed. "You're not even worth bothering with. Go home, human."

But he didn't go home. Instead, the man called Kuwabara charged at Hiei straight-on, with abominable technique belying his strength. The shorter man promptly knocked him off his feat, then beat him black and blue for a bit until he was bored.

"Go home," he repeated. And Kuwabara did.

He didn't stay there, though. The next week he was back, healed and ugly as ever. Hiei had been trying to enjoy a nap in his favorite tree, but had no choice but to teach the oaf a lesson.

Kuwabara didn't learn the lesson. He was almost impressively dense, because he came back. And then, after that ended in a beating as well, he returned yet again.

Hiei didn't bother to unleash the flames of the dragon on the foolish man, instead using him as a dummy for sword practice. There was something _almost_ admirable about his persistence. Almost.

* * *

"Your friend is here again," Kurama remarked one day as they sat in Yukina's garden, drinking her homegrown tea.

Hiei's brow furrowed. "He's _not_ my friend," he spat. He'd barely acknowledge Kurama as a friend, and they'd been on good terms for years now.

"Whatever," the thief said lightly. His eyes sparkled with mirth, as though he were enjoying his own private joke.

"He's just another idiot determined to get his hands on Yukina."

"There _are_ so many. What if Yukina wants a suitor, someday? Someone to love?" Kurama asked, genuinely curious. Hiei treated his twin as a child, and while the sweet-natured girl was happy for now, she'd inevitably want to experience more of life someday.

"Then at least it'll have to be a suitable one! Someone strong enough to protect her, and smart enough to keep her out of trouble. Gentle, too." Hiei's red eyes flickered to the thief. "Someone more like _you_."

Kurama laughed. "Is that what you're after, allowing me here? I'm sorry, Hiei, but I'm afraid that Yukina's not my type." Something in his gaze and smile made Hiei's face feel warm, so he turned away.

"I'd better go deal with that oaf," he muttered. Kurama watched him go, not bothering to hold back a grin.

Yukina could recognize the sound of Kuwabara Kazuma's voice even from a distance. It was one of the few that she'd hear more than once. Today, however, his boisterous voice was coming from just a few meters away from her spot in the garden. How had he gotten past Hiei? She was so curious she forgot to even think of being afraid.

Kneeling amongst the cabbages, the ice maiden turned her head and for the first time saw the man whose voice had become familiar over the past months. He was tall, far taller than she or Hiei. His body was wrapped in muscle, and his hair was an odd, rusty color. He wasn't handsome, not like Kurama. But Yukina didn't find him unpleasant to look at, either. There was something about his eyes…

Kuwabara stared at the girl in the garden, paralyzed by her beauty. He'd heard rumors, of course, but they did not come close to the truth of it. She was like frost on a windowpane, a flower in a storm, a star on a cloudless night. Kuwabara wasn't given to eloquence, but the sight of Yukina stirred him to poetry.

"Yukina," he croaked. She smiled at him shyly as she stood, and he could feel his heart pounding in his throat. "I'm Kuwabara Kazuma."

"I know," Yukina said, before he could continue. He looked puzzled, so she explained. "I've heard you introduce yourself every time you've come by. It's very nice to meet you, Kazuma-san."

_Kazuma-san_. Almost no one called him by his given name, just his family. But when his sister or parents used his name, it didn't sound half so sweet.

"This is for you. A token of my love for you." He thrust forward the pink ribbon he'd bought for her. Shizuru had told him that if he wanted to court a girl, he ought to bring gifts. But as Yukina's pale hand reached out to accept the slip of fabric, he found himself at a loss. Now that he was actually face to face with her, he wasn't sure of what more to say. He'd played it out a hundred times in his head as he lay in bed at night, but this was different. This was _real_.

"It's very pretty! Thank you, Kazuma-san," Yukina said, beaming.

Before Kuwabara could solve the problem of what else to say to the love of his life, a figure appeared between them, pushing Yukina back away from the taller man.

"Stay away from her," Hiei hissed, eyes bright with rage.

Kuwabara wanted to fight, to rescue the beautiful Yukina from this harsh creature, but doing so here would ruin the garden she'd obviously poured so much love into. So he turned, insulting the fire demon by showing him his back. "Yeah, yeah. I'll be back, Yukina! Wait for me!"

Yukina, a bit confused by the whole situation, said nothing. But for the rest of the day, she rubbed her thumb over the silk of the ribbon, admiring its softness. _Kazuma_, she thought to herself, _I hope we meet again_.

* * *

The next time Kuwabara came, Hiei was just finishing off a pair of weasel-faced men who couldn't hide their excitement at the thought of getting their slimy hands on a source of hiruseki stones. They'd been plenty mouthy about their plans, so Hiei had taken his time with them. No one who wanted to hurt Yukina deserved a quick death.

Given the earlier visitors, Hiei was in a sour mood as he felt the idiot approaching. He looked up the tall human. "Who're you, again?" he asked, wiping blood off the blade of his katana.

"I'm Kuwabara Kazuma, and I'm here to save Yukina!" Kuwabara shouted, far more loudly than necessary. Hiei was hardly two meters away, he could _hear_ him just fine already.

"I'm sure I've told you before: stay away from Yukina."

"You can't stand in the way of true love, shrimp."

_Love_. What did the oaf mean with his foolish proclamations, always using _that_ word? Yukina was safe, here. She didn't need whatever flimsy excuse for love this pathetic man would force upon her.

"I'm not in the mood to play today. Leave if you value your life."

Kuwabara was undeterred. He charged, as bullheaded as ever, and Hiei met him with his blade.

Yukina came running out just in time to see her brother plunge his sword into Kuwabara's abdomen. Her snowy face went even paler as blood immediately sprang up from the wound. Hiei withdrew his blade, stony-faced, and turned away as Kuwabara collapsed onto the grass.

He was surprised to see Yukina, and more surprised by the look on her face. Of course, he reminded himself. She was upset by the sight of violence. He should have finished off the idiot somewhere where she wouldn't have to see.

For some reason he could not fathom, the ice maiden rushed past him, throwing herself towards the man bleeding on the ground. A pink ribbon fluttered in her hair. Hiei didn't recognize it.

"Kazuma-san! Kazuma-san!" Yukina thrust both hands onto Kuwabara's gaping wound, pouring her energy into him intently. She'd always been decent at healing, but she couldn't afford to be just decent. Not now. Sweat beaded her brow as she focused on knitting tissue together and stemming the flow of blood. Behind her, Hiei was speaking, but she tuned out his words. She couldn't spare even an ounce of her attention.

"Please, Kazuma-san, stay with me," she cried. Dampness rolled down her cheeks. Whether it was perspiration or teardrops, she didn't know. By some miracle, Kuwabara responded to her healing better than anyone before, the flesh beneath her hands eager to obey her every whim. Slowly, the wound scabbed over, pushing him out of danger, and Yukina slumped forward, drained of all energy. He would live. Kazuma would live.

* * *

When Kuwabara woke, it was to the crackling of a fire. He turned his head, mildly surprised to be alive, and saw his love standing in front of a fireplace stirring a pot. She gifted him with a beatific smile, and Kuwabara wondered if perhaps he _was_ dead. It wouldn't surprise him if his lovely Yukina was actually an angel.

"I'm glad to see you awake, Kazuma-san," she said, bringing him a bowl of whatever concoction had been bubbling over the fire.

"Did you save me? I thought for sure I was a goner."

She blushed, lowering her eyes. "I have a talent for healing," she said demurely.

"I should have guessed. You're amazing, Yukina!" Kuwabara said loudly. His ribs hurt only a little when he threw back his head and laughed for joy.

She smiled again. Kuwabara started talking, then, and she laughed when he said something funny, and gasped when he told her a shocking story, and listened raptly to whatever he said. He wasn't as witty as Kurama, but he was somehow far more fun to talk to. Yukina hadn't realized how much she'd wanted something like this until now. Time passed quickly, neither of them noticing the afternoon slipping away until the fire flickered out and the room was very dark indeed.

"Enough." It was Hiei, standing in the doorway with his face like granite. "Yukina, I have been patient. Fool, it is time for you to go. If you know what's best for you, you won't come back."

"You can't keep Yukina from me," Kuwabara snarled, holding out an arm protectively in front of the ice maiden. Hiei snorted. He would never hurt Yukina. The only thing she had to fear was getting Kuwabara's blood on even more of her clothes.

"Do you want to challenge me again? I'll kill you," Hiei said, honestly. It was not a threat, merely a statement of fact.

"Please, Kazuma-san, you must go. You're still injured." Yukina's voice was soft, even sad. She looked at Kuwabara with gentle eyes, and rested her hand on his. "Don't let yourself get hurt for my sake."

She truly was too kind, too pure, too sweet to bear. Kuwabara gritted his teeth. His mind burned with plans for returning, but blood felt cold beneath his skin.

Yukina watched as he walked away. Her eyes didn't leave his retreating figure until it disappeared past the line of her sight; even then, she stared at the horizon for a long, long time.

* * *

It was two months since Kuwabara had last come for Yukina, and she was beginning to believe that he would not come again. It confused her that she was made sad by the thought of never seeing him again. She felt sick at her own selfishness, wishing for the presence of a man who would only be in danger if he came to her.

Hiei noticed Yukina's listlessness, but it baffled him. She went through the motions of her life, but something was clearly not quite right. She tended her garden, but missed many ripe fruits until they were rotting on the ground. The meals she cooked lacked salt. When she washed their clothes, she left them on the clothesline overnight, forgotten.

Worried, Hiei swallowed some of his considerable pride and sent for Kurama. The fox was a thief, not a doctor, but Hiei only knew one doctor- and he wouldn't let Shigure near Yukina if it cost him his life.

"Is she ill?" Hiei demanded, glaring up at his friend. "Does she need some vitamin, some tonic?"

Kurama only shook his head, a half-smile twisting his lips. "The thing she needs is far beyond even your power." A riddle. Why, Hiei cursed silently, did the fox always speak in such convoluted ways?

"You're not nearly as helpful as I'd hoped," he grunted.

"Why Hiei, I'm touched you had any hopes for me at all!" the redhead replied lightly. "Would you like to know what _my _hopes are, for you?" He stepped closer to the fire demon, and leaned down, just for a moment. Just enough to watch the smaller man's cheeks begin to color. He didn't push his luck further than that.

* * *

Yukina was in the tower when Kuwabara finally returned. He had changed, his aura dramatically stronger as he came trudging resolutely up the hill. She wanted to run to him, but she was paralyzed by some unfathomable emotion, and could only sit in her window and watch as he approached. She did not even move to brush away the tears that had gathered unbidden in the corners of her eyes.

Hiei had no such compunctions, and disappeared from his sister's side to meet the man in the clearing before the tower. Wildflowers swayed in a nonexistent wind. The air itself was responding to the power of the two men. The fire demon had not yet drawn his sword, but as Kuwabara approached he pulled one hand from his pocket, something clutched in his fist.

"My name is Kuwabara Kazuma," the tall man said, his voice low and dangerous, "and I am here for Yukina."

"Take this and go, you fool. Don't trouble my sister any further." Hiei tossed a small gem through the air at Kuwabara.

"What's this?" the human asked, holding the hiruseki stone up to the sunlight as he fixed it with a puzzled stare.

"This will buy you a life far away. You can live in comfort, find some other girl." As far as he was concerned, Hiei was being generous. It was only to spare Yukina the sight of more bloodshed that he was even tolerating the man's continued existence.

"You… are you trying to _pay me off?_" Kuwabara roared, knuckles white as he clenched a huge fist around the priceless stone. "And you call me a fool!"

"One of Yukina's tears to never see you again. It seems a fair price to me."

Kuwabara looked confused. It was not a flattering expression on his hammy face. "What do you mean, Yukina's tears?"

Now it was Hiei's turn to look nonplussed. "You're telling me you don't know? That's a hiruseki stone. She cried it just now, when she saw you from her window."

"She… cried?" Kuwabara asked, all the bluster gone from his voice along with the blood from his face. There was something like fear in his dark eyes. It was odd, Hiei thought. In all their fights, even when he struck a fatal blow, the man had never looked so hurt. "Yukina cried because I came?"

"That's what I just told you," Hiei said. He felt unsure. Fights with swords and fists he could deal with, but this exchange of words was beyond his expertise. Where was that damn fox when you needed him?

With a wordless cry, Kuwabara tossed the hiruseki stone back at Hiei, who plucked it automatically from the air even as shock registered in his eyes. No one threw away a hiruseki stone. Did the oaf miss the part where it was worth wealth beyond wealth?

"If it makes Yukina cry, I won't come again," Kuwabara said. He'd turned his back on the demon already, so Hiei couldn't see his expression, only hear a strange roughness in the man's voice.

_Good_, Hiei wanted to say, but the words were stuck in his throat. This was wrong, somehow, though he wasn't sure where he'd misstepped. "After all this, you're giving up so easily?" He wasn't even certain where those words had come from.

"Easily? _Easily?_ I'm not _giving up_, you rotten little pipsqueak. I'm the great man Kuwabara, and I won't make a woman cry!" He whirled on Hiei in a frenzied rage.

If Kuwabara had been an ice maiden, Hiei thought, that would have been an uncountable fortune streaming from his eyes.

Then there was a soft _thud_ as Yukina jumped from the tower, landing roughly in the dirt. She pushed herself up, mindless of the dirt on her kimono, and ran forward with a speed borne of desperation. "Kazuma-san!"

"I'm sorry, Yukina," Kuwabara ground out, "I will not bother you again."

"_No_, Kazuma! You're wrong. You're both wrong. I… I'm not bothered at all by you being here. It's the opposite," the ice maiden cried, throwing herself between the two men and wrapping her arms around Kuwabara's waist.

Hiei and Kuwabara's eyes were both wide with shock. The fire demon recovered his voice first. "Yukina… do you love this man?" he asked, Kurama's words rising from his memory.

"I don't know," she admitted, not releasing her grip. "But I think maybe I want to find out."

And then Kuwabara was laughing almost hysterically, and his huge oafish hands went around Yukina's waist as he hoisted her into the air with a grin as though he hadn't just been crying. She giggled at the gesture, but didn't protest, so Hiei didn't cut off the man's arms.

"I see," the fire demon said, although he wasn't sure he did. He took a few steps backwards, but the couple before him didn't seem to notice. They were both talking at once, Yukina softly, Kuwabara overly loudly, and smiling entirely too much.

Hiei retreated, cowed by the emotional display, and fled to the spot where he knew he could find a certain master thief who could explain this whole mess to him. He would return in short order to make sure Yukina was safe, of course. But for the first time since he'd rescued her, he felt that perhaps she was better of in someone else's hands. Just for a moment. Just while he figured out how he'd screwed up.

Kurama would explain. He was _good_ at that sort of thing. And other sorts of things, too, although Hiei didn't know about those quite yet.

They didn't all live happily ever after, at least not at first. Yukina was very shy and sheltered, after all, and it took her entirely too long to figure out the love that Kuwabara offered her. Kuwabara, for his part, stuck his foot in his mouth so often he could have been a contortionist. They kept getting in the way of themselves on their path to each other. Their height difference made kissing a chore, and HIei's glowers ruined any sort of mood -

But after a fashion, they lived quite happily. And for ever after, indeed.

_A/N: If you liked this story, or you have comments or critiques, please review! Nothing could make me happier. Except puppies._


End file.
